Football great Jim Brown addresses his old team the Cleveland Browns; they ALL stand for National Anthem

(National Sentinel) Sports & Politics: Last week, a dozen players for the NFL’s Cleveland Browns decided to sit out the National Anthem in protest.

Five days later, when the team played its third pre-season game, all Browns players stood for the anthem.

What happened?

Jim Brown happened, apparently.

As reported by Breitbart News, the Hall of Fame running back addressed his old team and told them, “Do not disrespect your country, do not disrespect the flag,” according to the Cleveland Plain-Dealer.

Breitbart noted:

How the leftist sports media reacts to Brown in coming days, will merit interest. Prior to the recent spate of athlete activism, most in the media regarded Brown as the embodiment of the activist athlete. However, just in the past couple days, Brown proudly highlighted out his American heritage while criticizing the practice of disrespecting the flag and the anthem. He also, in that same interview, pointed out the contradiction of trying to be an athlete and an activist.

It’s not known whether Brown’s influence will hold all season; chances are good he’s going to be savaged by many, especially fellow African-Americans who will no doubt call him all kinds of disparaging names while claiming he’s not “woke” enough.

Nevertheless, he makes a great point about trying to be an athlete and an activist at the same time: Can’t be done. Ultimately the fans decide what is and is not acceptable from players, not the players (or teams) themselves.